BETWEEN THE LINES

When racism doesn't make news

Joseph Farah is founder, editor and CEO of WND and a nationally syndicated columnist with Creators News Service.. He is the author or co-author of 13 books, including his latest, "The Tea Party Manifesto," and his classic, "Taking America Back," now in its third edition and 14th printing. Farah is the former editor of the legendary Sacramento Union and other major-market dailies.

Melissa Coon, mother of the 13-year-old boy who was set on fire. (photo: KMBC.com)

Like most people, when I read the trial-by-media reports of how Trayvon Martin was killed, it sounded terribly unjust, wrong, a tragedy of epic proportions.

It also sure sounded like law-enforcement may have blown it by not making an arrest.

But when the race hustlers like Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and race hustler-in-chief Barack Obama started exploiting the incident, I began to think we were being conned once, again, by the vicious, biased, America-hating, leftist-controlled press.

Maybe now the media will leave this one to law enforcement and the criminal justice department to sort out without jumping to conclusions.

But don’t expect any mea culpas from the news media that distorted this case to the point of national hysteria – even prompting death threats to the police chief.

Why?

Because the national news media are a hopelessly broken cultural institution.

They were ready to lynch George Zimmerman, who now appears to be no more than an upright Hispanic gentleman concerned about suspicious activity in his neighborhood – someone who probably did what he had to do in a very trying circumstance.

Meanwhile, another form of insidious racism – real racism – is leading to abominable hate crimes that go virtually unnoticed by the race-conscious witch-hunters in the media.

An example?

I hope you are not eating when you read the rest of this column.

A 13-year-old white boy was walking home from school last Tuesday in Kansas City when two black 16-year-olds accosted him two blocks from his home, chased him to his home as he struggled to get his front door open, doused him with gasoline and set him on fire with a Bic lighter, one of them saying, “This is what you deserve. You get what you deserve, white boy.”

He was consumed in “a large fireball” that burned his face and hair, according to the Kansas City police department.

The boy himself struggled to call 9-1-1, according to his mother, Melissa Coon. He was rushed to the hospital where the medical team fears he may have suffered permanent damage to his eyes and lungs.

Coon said she believes the students attend East High School with her son. But she will not be returning her son there even if he recovers. In fact, her family is so traumatized by the attack they plan to move from the area.

“My 5-year-old came in and asked me, ‘Mom, am I going to get set on fire today?’” Coon said. “I was in tears. We were told it’s a hate crime.”

Yes, I would say so. This is a real hate crime – the kind you won’t likely see reported on the national media and the kind you won’t likely hear race-hustling politicians like Sharpton, Jackson and Obama talking about.

Why?

Obama pointed out to the nation that if he had a son he would look like Trayvon Martin. That was somehow relevant to Obama. The implication is certainly that he cares more about kids who look like they could be his kids. Maybe it’s just that simple.

By the way, it is entirely plausible, though it is too early to assume, that the perpetrators in this hideous attack were actually inspired by the media’s drummed up hysterics about racism in the case of Trayvon Martin.

Wouldn’t that compound this tragedy?

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